Many victims make the mistake of trying to engage the insect physically. This approach is completely wrong. Unless you have ninja-cat-like reflexes you’re not going to take out the intruder with a fly swatter, a rolled up magazine or a shoe. Rubber bands work fine on flies, but then flies don’t sting. So the first step is remaining calm and not disturbing the insect. If you rile them up they’ll probably either sting you on the spot, or go hide somewhere so they can get you later (bastards).

The other thing you should avoid, although it is effective, is using wasp/hornet spray. That stuff works great outdoors, but not so much inside. There’s no greater feeling that unleashing a 15 foot burst of toxic chemicals onto your enemy, while they writhe about as they slowly die. However, inside the home the fumes have nowhere to dissipate, so you’ll no doubt inhale them which will result in acute brain damage. Read the can, it’s a federal offense to use it in a manner inconsistent with it’s labeling. That phrase generally means don’t breathe the stuff. Even that friend of yours that’s always huffing stuff doesn’t want to breath it.

One time an uninvited wasp showed up in my kitchen, and instead of calmly engaging the invader I let panic take hold. I couldn’t find anything like wasp spray, and in my frenzied state of disarray I unleashed a fire extinguisher on the insect. Now it definitely worked, but in the process I used up my extinguisher, which can evidently only be used once, and I also left a fine coat of nasty powder over the entire kitchen. This method is not recommended, although in a pinch it does work.

Your main goal when dealing with a flying machine of doom should be to get their wings wet so they can’t fly. This is frighteningly easy to do. Even a spray bottle of water will work, although it’s best to use something really gunky that will insure their capacity to fly has been diminished. Common household things like Lysol do the trick amazingly well. In particular, my room mate had purchased some foaming Lysol (unbeknownst to me). So I was responding to an attack,expecting to simply coat the little bastard’s wings then squash him as he struggled to comprehend what was happening. To my sheer and utter delight I was greeted by spray of thick foam which coated the entire insect, who immediately dropped to the floor. His wings now worthless, he started trying to walk. I hosed him down again for good measure then calmly went to retrieve a paper towel. When I returned he had walked about 8 inches, hopefully in grueling agony. At this point I smashed him with my shoe and cleaned up the mess with the paper towel. The Lysol left a nice refreshing & clean smell behind and made cleanup easy, and with no neurologically damaging chemicals in the air.

The key to pulling this off is moving slowly and remaining calm. These insects are fairly stupid, so they won’t see you coming unless you move too quickly. Obtain your spray, aerosol is preferred (the spray equivalent of an automatic machine-gun) then slowly & quietly creep up on your prey. Hold the can at arms length and move close enough so that you’re within firing range. Once you’re target has been acquired (approx. 4-12 inches in proximity) discharge your weapon. Be sure to coat the menace adaquately so that their wings are good and soaked. Once they’re incapacitated they should fall to the ground and you may commence crushing their evil little body with your shoe. Clean up with a paper towel or toilet paper. Flushing them down the toilet is a fitting way to dispose of their worthless remains.

If you have any additional tips or tricks that have served you well feel free to share them here!

Wesley Dysart – Feb. 2011 Promo DJ Mix by Wesleydysart on Mixcloud

Even more!

Anyway, this particular nightmare isn’t exactly the most frightening thing in the world. It’s simply one that I keep having over and over and when it happens it feels particularly strange, like a Lynch film where your reality is completely different, yet memory from another world persists. So here’s how it goes: I dream that I’m late for school, and I’ve been oversleeping for a long time, as in weeks. It’s so bad in fact that I’ve completely missed a class or two, just never showed up. I always make it in time for this one class, and I’m always nervous that the teachers will get together and figure out that I’m dodging the earlier classes. This dream will skip around from being at home and rushing out the door to sneaking on campus to prowling around the school past classrooms I’m supposed to be in. The perceived time in these dreams can be a few hours, days or even weeks. It’s like when you go under anesthesia, it just goes black and you awaken at a new time.

What’s really odd and mind boggling (at least while I’m experiencing it) is that my mind from the present time fights with this flashback to being a student. In the dream I’ll be thinking to myself, I have two degrees, why am I going to school? These little “tells” can awaken your conscious mind inside the dream, this sometimes makes you feel really drunk or high as your motionless body in bed struggles against the one in your mind that’s walking, driving, etc. I’ll be mentally and physically between worlds as it were, and it’s very frustrating. It’s great to wake up and realize I’m not late, I’m not going to fail a class and all is well.

Full disclosure: I don’t like waking up. I sleep until the very last minute and get ready in a flash. I prefer having no set time at which to arise. So this could all simply be a manifestation of guilt from not being an early bird, but in response to that old adage I always say; “The second mouse gets the cheese”.

-W

And the big closing track I dropped at SC7 came out, had an incredible amount of fun making this one:

From there I finally got to work on a remix with my lifelong friend & label partner DJ Notech.

Michael Woodruff’s ‘Class-E’:

So sometime around Halloween, give or take, I started to get anxious about my good ole APC40 and got to speaking with one of the reps at Sweetwater. It had been months I was unable to DJ or do livePA sets, so I was understandably frustrated. Sweetwater offered me full store credit in place of the damaged unit. To this day I think that’s one of the most awesome customer service experiences I’ve ever had. Huge thanks to Dennis & Eryk! So I got into the Novation Launchpad, some say it’s like a giant TV remote, which is precisely why I love the thing! Plus my color blind eyes can make out the red/green buttons much better. I will totally vouch for this controller, it’s affordable, works instantly and it small & functional. I haven’t found anything not to love on there. And for a main controller, with which to manipulate the sounds I elected to make the plunge and get something fancy. After much forum scouring I settled on the Livid Instruments OHM 64, and I haven’t looked back. Everything feels ultra solid and it’s allowed me to get back into making music while standing on my feet (new promo sets coming soon, I promise

I went ahead and sprung for a custom unit (pictured right). It’s got a white metal body with blue LED’s and yellow wooden side panels. It’s beautiful and a joy to play with. Not to mention, the underlying software is open source and there’s a dedicated community of users. You can feel the love. You can see a quick little video I made of this thing in action here: Wesley Dysart’s custom Livid OHM 64

Steamtown Records had great 2010. Aside from many strong releases that have been well received by notable folks across the world we’ve also been joined by some incredible new artists that I’m proud to be releasing music alongside. First, Travis Thatcher of ‘Judi Chicago’ worked on a few remixes as ‘The Voice of Saturn’, and he’s about to drop a wicked EP with some originals and an army of remixes.

And while in Vancouver I was privileged to share the stage with a phenom of a live performer; Dark Arps.

We got to talking and it turns out he has a lot in common with the hobos currently residing at the Steamtown camp, mainly; a love of electronic music and the heart of a musical wanderer. So he’s now one of us and we look forward to hearing lots more

Around X-mas time he put out a tune that fuses dubstep & progressive, the results are cause to get down! The tune is available as a free download from Steamtown Records: 

We’re all gonna keep making music that we believe in and finding places to share it with you in person at high volumes, so stay tuned, follow us on Soundcloud, Twitter & Facebook, sign up for the newsletter and don’t miss out!